1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to nanotechnology, and particularly to the synthesis of zinc oxide nanocomposites using poly (ionic liquid) (PIL) and the potential use thereof as adsorbents for treating wastewater.
2. Description of the Related Art
Zinc oxide nanoparticles have attracted attention as environmentally friendly materials that can be used in different environmental applications. Their nanostructure displays great advances in water purification. It has been found that zinc salts play important roles in the size and morphologies of the prepared nanoparticles. For example, zinc nitrate salt has been used to prepare ZnO nanoparticles using an amine. The modification of ZnO nanoparticles using poly(vinyl pyrrolidone) or poly(vinyl alcohol) controls their optical properties, dispersion efficiency, and photocatalytic performance.
Currently, ionic liquids (ILs) are playing an important role in preparing stabilized nanomaterials at room temperature having low general toxicity, high dispersion in water, and stability to air oxidation with controlled particle sizes. Moreover, ILs have interesting properties as a capping agent for nanomaterials over recently used chemical agents because they are a nontoxic hydrophilic solvent with tunable polarity and coordinate with nanomaterials or water pollutants. Poly (ionic liquids), PILs, possess the combined properties of ILs and polymers, which can act as highly stabilized capping agents for metal and metal oxide nanomaterial and carbon nanotubes. The literature is fairly limited in using PILs as capping and reducing agents to prepare metal or metal oxide nanomaterials, such as titanium dioxide and zinc oxide, that are used as photocatalysts to discharge the pollutants, e.g., organic reactive dyes. Zinc oxide is one of the most important photocatalytic materials, and has been extensively used for the removal of toxic dyes and pigments that could pose serious threat for the aquatic ecosystem. However, one of disadvantages affecting its application in practice is the fast recombination of photo-generated electron-hole pairs when it is applied as a photo-catalyst in water treatment processes.
Thus, the synthesis of zinc oxide nanocomposites using poly (ionic liquid) solving the aforementioned problems is desired.